Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that strengthening the BRICS group of emerging economies is one of Russia’s foreign policy priorities.

President Putin was speaking at a meeting with senior military staff at the russian defence ministry on Wednesday.

He called for strengthening the BRICS group, greater Eurasian integration, expanding the single economic space and possibly turning it into an economic union and boosting the military capabilities of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO).

The Russian president spoke at length on the changing geopolitical situation and asserted that, “Russia should help develop a multipolar world.”

“We see how instability and conflict are spreading around the world today. Armed conflict continues in the Middle East and Asia, and the danger of ‘export’ of radicalism and chaos continues to grow in our neighbouring regions,” he reiterated.

The president also warned that systematic attempts are being made to undermine the existing strategic balance of forces.

“Systematic attempts are being made from the outside to disrupt the strategic balance in this or that manner. In fact, the second stage of the US global missile defence system is being launched, and the possibilities for further NATO eastward expansion are being explored,” Putin said.

“The danger of the militarization of the Arctic also persists,” he added.

Putin claimed that while these challenges affect Russia’s national interests, they also push Russia into determining its foreign policy priorities.

57 founding members, many of them prominent US allies, will sign into creation the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank on Monday, the first major global financial instrument independent from the Bretton Woods system.

Representatives of the countries will meet in Beijing on Monday to sign an agreement of the bank, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said on Thursday. All the five BRICS countries are also joining the new infrastructure investment bank.

The agreement on the $100 billion AIIB will then have to be ratified by the parliaments of the founding members, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said at a daily press briefing in Beijing.

The AIIB is also the first major multilateral development bank in a generation that provides an avenue for China to strengthen its presence in the world’s fastest-growing region.